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Myth # 3: Governance cannot be defined?
By Kaufmann | March 26, 2008 1 Comment »
In debunking the previous myth, I tried to challenge those ‘governoskeptics’ who doubt that governance and rule of law matter much for growth and development. Yet governoskeptics come in different guises; for instance there are those that do not believe that governance can be measured — I leave that claim for a future blog entry. Here I address those ‘governoskeptics’ who claim that governance is nearly impossible to define.
There are many different definitions of governance. Some are extremely broad, coming close to equating it with development itself. One illustration of this side of the spectrum is by the famed Doug North some time ago: “How do we account for poverty in the midst of plenty? ….. We must create incentives for people to invest in more efficient technology, increase their skills, and organize efficient markets ….. Such incentives are embodied in institutions”. Worse, applications by others are even more ‘tautological’, explicitly including within governance some core development outcomes such as per capita income or its distribution. Such tautology does not further our understanding of what governance is, of course, and impedes our ability to ask whether governance is important for development or viceversa –simply, we would have not been able to address myth #2.
At the other extreme of the spectrum there are those who tend to view governance very narrowly, within a public sector economic management lense. An example of this ‘anorexic’ version happens to come from the World Bank many years ago, which saw governance as “…the manner in which power is exercised in the management of a country’s economic and social resources for development”. In some governments and organizations around the world there are still those who would prefer the anorexic version of governance, belittling the role of civil society voice and the fundamental freedoms of the citizenry, such as the right to an honest vote, to give and receive uncensored information, and to be free of state-sponsored torture. There is a parallel here with the discussion in last week’s article in The Economist, where an interpretation of Rule of Law may be ’thin’ enough to be strictly equated with Law and Order, which would leave out all the politically inconvenient content.
So this definitional range spans the two extremes, from the anorexics to the tautologists. Yet nowadays many, though not all, may be of the view that neither extreme is satisfactory, and would seek a more centrist notion. At the outset of my decade long collaboration with Aart Kraay in the “Governance Matters” series, drawing from the literature, we defined governance as “…the traditions and institutions by which authority in a country is exercised. This includes the process by which governments are selected, monitored and replaced; the capacity of the government to effectively formulate and implement sound policies; and the respect of citizens and the state for the institutions that govern economic and social interactions among them”. In that definition, we tried to encompass the relevant political, institutional and economic dimensions of governance (rather than focusing only on the latter), while stopping short from being so broad to also include development outcomes within such notion of governance, so to avoid the tautology trap.
There are nowadays a number of centrist variants in defining governance, each with its own merits. But the main point is that once one has steered clear from the anorexics and tautologists, the extent of the disagreement among the centrist rest will be of second order, or worse, splitting hairs. Practically speaking, irrespective of which centrist definition of governance one prefers, it would be expected to include the effective and honest functioning of the key institutions in the executive, legislative and the judiciary –state capabilities and rule of law–, the rules of the game governing a level playing field for dynamic private sector development, basic principles of opennesss and transparency, and the protection of human and property rights as well as of media and citizen freedoms.
A particularly distorted variant of the anorexics comes from some anti-corruption zealots, who tend to equate governance with corruption. That is another myth. If we take the centrist definition of governance mentioned above, controlling corruption, is part of good governance, but only one among a number of key dimensions. In fact, looking at the standard definition of corruption “the abuse of public office for private gain”, it is clear how different it is from any reasonable definition of governance. [I leave the problems with this old definition of corruption, which places an overly legalistic limelight on public officials, for future blogging.]
The focus here is on the case against the governoskeptics, governorexics and tautologists. And also on constructively suggesting that there is already a set of definitions to choose from, most of which are eminently reasonable. Whichever centrist definition of governance one prefers, it is important to focus concretely on the next stage. That means emphasis on rigorous measurement, monitoring, and analysis of governance at the country, subnational and institutional level. And focusing on the formulation and implementation of sensible strategies and actions. Let us keep in mind that in parallel to the continuing academic debates on concepts and definitions, some country leaders and public institutions, as well as countless citizens and NGOs, have been carrying out concrete actions to improve governance for a long time. Others haven’t.
[Aqui para un link a un blog entry en español]
Topics: Corruption, Measurement Frontiers, Public Financial Management, Public-Private Linkages, Rule of Law, Transparency, Voice and Human Rights | | 1 Comment
November 1st, 2008 at 12:56 am
I would like to share with you this definition of governance, which currently I’m using in my thesis work about governance in Regional Fisheries Management Organisations (RFMOs):
“the whole body of public as well as private interactions taken to solve problems and create societal opportunities. It includes the formulation of principles guiding those interactions and care for institutions that enable them” (Kooiman and Bavick, 2005: 17).
Kooiman, J. and M. Bavinck (2005), “The governing perspective”, in: Kooiman, J., et al. (Eds.), Fish for Life: Interactive Governance for Fisheries, pp. 11–24. Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam.
Saludos de un compatriota en New Zealand!
Mauricio Galvez